The Lockout & the Raptors: Players approve CBA, Owners too! (1944)

[TheGloveinRapsUniform]

When an agreement is reached it will be presented to the membership of each side to be ratified (ie. voted on). Assuming it is passed its game on. I guess a player could 'strike' but all that would result in is him losing his paycheque and possible legal action against him as he would have a legal contractual obligation (although I'm not sure that would happen but not impossible)

Considering they are part of the union I have no idea how they are 'butting in'. They have just as much right to input as anyone else. If thats the case no owner should have any input on the negotiations as that would be 'butting in'.

but i guess it would have a much larger impact if the likes of lebron and wade are the ones who go on strike.

well, input is one thing, but to actually voice their opinions out during negotiations is another. i havent heard any of the owners yelling and screaming at billy hunter during actual negotiations. true theyre part of the union, but isnt it the job of hunter to negotiate for the union? and the same with stern for the owners?

[Bendit]

but i guess it would have a much larger impact if the likes of lebron and wade are the ones who go on strike.

well, input is one thing, but to actually voice their opinions out during negotiations is another. i havent heard any of the owners yelling and screaming at billy hunter during actual negotiations. true theyre part of the union, but isnt it the job of hunter to negotiate for the union? and the same with stern for the owners?

As I understand it and as GT has written, once an agreement is ratified by both parties it becomes binding. The only recourse left players in disagreement is to retire or refuse to honor their existing contract which then allows the team to fine them as per cba rules. I am unsure whether the team or league can sue a player on grounds of hurting the business by refusing to honor the contract.

[TheGloveinRapsUniform]

As I understand it and as GT has written, once an agreement is ratified by both parties it becomes binding. The only recourse left players in disagreement is to retire or refuse to honor their existing contract which then allows the team to fine them as per cba rules. I am unsure whether the team or league can sue a player on grounds of hurting the business by refusing to honor the contract.

Thank you.
I guess they can play lackadaisically if they really hate the agreement.
I dont think the club can fine them for that.

[heinz57]

but i guess it would have a much larger impact if the likes of lebron and wade are the ones who go on strike.

[GarbageTime]

but i guess it would have a much larger impact if the likes of lebron and wade are the ones who go on strike.

well, input is one thing, but to actually voice their opinions out during negotiations is another. i havent heard any of the owners yelling and screaming at billy hunter during actual negotiations. true theyre part of the union, but isnt it the job of hunter to negotiate for the union? and the same with stern for the owners?

Each side has a 'team' of guys. So Hunter and Fischer head the union, then each team has a union rep. Who all is actually in the meetings I couldn't say for sure though.

As for none of the owners screaming at hunter.... well none of the union members have been pointing fingers or talking down to owners either. If either side was trying to make friends here things would go alot smoother.

[TheGloveinRapsUniform]

Each side has a 'team' of guys. So Hunter and Fischer head the union, then each team has a union rep. Who all is actually in the meetings I couldn't say for sure though.

As for none of the owners screaming at hunter.... well none of the union members have been pointing fingers or talking down to owners either. If either side was trying to make friends here things would go alot smoother.

That makes sense.

[ezz_bee]

Yeah it is. It's classic and was entirely predictable months ago.

I can agree that the negotiations could be framed under "game theory" but I don't see how it equates to the Prisoner's dilemma specifically.

The PD has only three outcomes for each prisoner

1) GO free (if they rat out the other prisoner who stays silent)
2) Short sentence (if they stay silent and the other prisoner stays silent)
3) Mid-term prison sentence (if they stay silent and the other prisoner stays silent)
3) Long term sentance (if they stay silent and the other prisoner rats them out.

What PD demonstrates is that collectively, the prisoners will do the best if they both stay silent. They both get the short sentence. HOWEVER, because each prisoner had to act without know what the other prisoner is doing as an individual it makes to most sense to rat out their partner, because then their worst case scenario is the mid-term sentence and possible to get off scott free. However, BOTH individuals are likely to choose this option and therefore BOTH get the mid-sentence. Thus they are both worse off had they both kept quiet.

The Prisoner's dilemma does not apply to the NBA for a number of reasons.

1) Choices: In the PD both sides face the SAME choices, with the SAME consequences. This is NOT the case with the NBA negotiations. Theoretically it could be possible to frame the corresponding choices with corresponding outcomes to each side, but I don't think they work with this case. IF you could demonstrate that they do have corresponding choices with corresponding outcomes then I would rethink this point, but I think that it would very difficult without reducing the actions/consequences to such a vague abstraction that it isn't really meaningful.

EDIT: found a scholarly source that does this have quoted below with the prediction it makes

2) Power: in the Prisoner's dilemma BOTH parties have Equal power to make decisions.

3) Symmetry: The Prisoner's dilemma is described in game theory as a symmetrical game where the payoffs for playing a particular strategy depend only on the other strategies employed, not on who is playing them.

4) Number of times the game is played: In the PD, the game is, and can only be played once. The prisoners can only make 1 choice, aka choose 1 strategy and stick with it. In the NBA each meeting is an individual game; however, both players are aware of the choices/strategies the other players used in the PAST (previous meetings/games) and use that information to make decisions on how they will act in the PRESENT game/meeting.

In my opinion the "game" being played in the NBA negotiations is more like the Ultimatum Game.

The ultimatum game is a game often played in economic experiments in which two players interact to decide how to divide a sum of money that is given to them. The first player proposes how to divide the sum between the two players, and the second player can either accept or reject this proposal. If the second player rejects, neither player receives anything. If the second player accepts, the money is split according to the proposal. The game is played only once so that reciprocation is not an issue

The ultimatum game, like PD the ultimatum game can only be played once.

In terms of trying to reduce the complex negotiation that is the NBA lockout, I think the Ultimatum game is the most accurate, however, it is played multiple times, with the role of the player making the offer switching between the two parties. The outcome of the Ultimatum game would lead to a general 50/50 split of the money. However, the ultimate game doesn't take into account a couple of key information. 1) The others have other costs, which may make them more likely to want more than the 50%. 2) The players are coming out of a previous agreement wherein they had a 57% of that split. I think that whatever the outcome of the negotiations, they will be within a close enough range of the 50/50 to uphold the results of the ultimatum game. Unfortunately, this doesn't provide us with any new or meaningful insights in to the negotiations.

To get more meaningful insights the best method would to use Metagame Analysis which has the theoretical framework to analyse and give outcomes for something as complex as the NBA negotiations. However, A LOT of time is needed to satisfy the methodology, and although possible would be very difficult and time consuming for someone without at least an undergrad in math (which I don't have).

Here is a scholarly paper on Professional Sports labour negotiations and game theory

JUST CLICK HERE

In the paper they do frame the negotiations in the form of the PD

In Prisoner’s Dilemma there are two agents (here management and labor),
each of whom can pursue either of two actions. Each can either be aggressive
(uncooperative) in the negotiations or each can be conciliatory(cooperative). The
payoff received by one party depends not only on its own action, but on the action
of the other. As depicted in the previous article, the payoffs of each party are
represented in matrix form in Table 1, where first entry in each cell of the matrix
reflects management’s payoff from a combination of actions, while the second
entry reflects labor’s payoff. For example, if management is aggressive, but labor
is conciliatory, then management’s payoff is +10, while labor’s payoff is –10.
In the absence of any communication from its counterpart, each party in the
game has a dominant strategy—to behave noncooperatively. That is, whichever
strategy one party adopts, the other party is better off taking an aggressive stance in
the negotiations [2]. Clearly, however, both parties pursuing noncooperative
behavior leads to an outcome (here (–5, –5)) that is suboptimal in the sense that
both parties would be better off if each cooperated for a payoff of (+5, +5). Thus,
each agent in the game pursuing its rational self-interest achieves a state that is
said to be Pareto-inferior. Even if communication were allowed between the
parties, there is no assurance that a better outcome would be reached. To achieve a
cooperative outcome, both parties would have to agree to be conciliatory. Such an
agreement, though, would be unstable without some enforcement mechanism
because each agent (if it believed its partner would be cooperative) would have the
incentive to cheat on the agreement (i.e., be aggressive), thereby raising its payoff
from +5 to +10. The moral of Prisoner’s Dilemma, then, for collective bargaining
is that the relationships established are edgy at best. Cooperation and trust between
the parties are difficult to create and to maintain.

I still think that the Ultimatum game is more reflective game though.



If we combine the outcomes offered by BOTH the prisoner's dilemma and the ultimatum game, we can predict that they will eventually come to a 50/50 split although reaching the point where they are willing to agree on the split will be very difficult to come to, and will be very tenuous (neither side will be willing to meet in the middle for very long).

although these predictions will probably be perceived as having been met once the negotiations are complete (whenever that is), to me they seem like the kind of answers we'd get if asked a psychic. If we had any mathematical model nerds on the site, they could probably give us juicier predictions on what will happen.

You've been tasked!

[Apollo]

Nothing new: Owners would rather miss the season rather than sign a bad deal

No indication of progress yet. But continue to hear from sources that some owners prefer to miss season rather than accept bad deal.

Source: Twitter @KBergCBS

[ezz_bee]

No indication of progress yet. But continue to hear from sources that some owners prefer to miss season rather than accept bad deal.

Source: Twitter @KBergCBS

I think word "some" is the key word in that tweet. How many is "some"? It would also help if we had an idea which owners had this position.

[mcHAPPY]

Trevor
Can you explain why the players care so much about system issues instead of just BRI? Players don’t get the exact amount of money in their contracts, they get more or less depending on whether the sum total of the players’ contracts is below or above the BRI. So, all contracts really guarantee is each player’s cut of the NBPA’s share of the BRI. What am I missing?

Larry Coon
It’s true that the BRI split controls how much money the players get in the aggregate. But per-team, the system issues have a big effect. If there’s a hard cap — either a true hard cap or an effective one via a prohibitive luxury tax — the distribution of salaries will change. The stars will continue to get big money, and the minimum & rookie scale salary guys will continue to get their allotted salaries. But this won’t leave much for the rest of the players. The end effect is that the middle class will be squeezed out. This is an important issue to the players. Most of the lower-rung guys don’t have any delusions about signing a max deal, but most do see themselves signing a mid-level contract.

http://www.hoopsworld.com/salary-cap...y-coon-101911/

This might be the answer to my 53% BRI divided by 30 with a payroll of $70.7M for each team.

I think making this a quasi cap with 2 roster spots for minimum contracts, first 2 years of rookie deal, lowering minimum number of roster spots to 12, and removing years played from the max deal formula (i.e. X million per season is a max contract) should offer more than enough money to go around.

However, this might only lead to more fringe franchise players getting max money - although guys like Brand and Bosh are getting it now as well.

[Joey]

However, this might only lead to more fringe franchise players getting max money - although guys like Brand and Bosh are getting it now as well.

And this is what I was asking earlier .. whats being done to stop these owners from giving Eddy Curry $10M or $12M if, at the time, they feel he deserves it, and then he goes and f*cks the dog for 4 years?
Or stopping them from giving Joe Johnson a MAX deal, after he's been an All-Star for 5 years in a row?

The only thing that would fix this is Non-Guaranteed Contracts, and I don't see it happening.
The players argue, and point to the NFL, where servicable, good, contributing players, are being released from their contract simply as a money saving move, and ultimately having nothing to do with their performance on the field.

The system will remain broken long after these CBA negotiations. It will still be up to the owners to exercise Fiscal Restraint, and they have shown time and time again, they are NOT capable of doing that.

[TheGloveinRapsUniform]

This might be the answer to my 53% BRI divided by 30 with a payroll of $70.7M for each team.

I think making this a quasi cap with 2 roster spots for minimum contracts, first 2 years of rookie deal, lowering minimum number of roster spots to 12, and removing years played from the max deal formula (i.e. X million per season is a max contract) should offer more than enough money to go around.

However, this might only lead to more fringe franchise players getting max money - although guys like Brand and Bosh are getting it now as well.

ok im on the fence now.
so you mean larry coon is saying that with the hard cap, the mid level players wont have anything left for them?
so essentially, lebron, wade and garnett are fighting for themselves and the interest of the mid-level players?
i dont know which side to take anymore.

[mcHAPPY]

ok im on the fence now.
so you mean larry coon is saying that with the hard cap, the mid level players wont have anything left for them?
so essentially, lebron, wade and garnett are fighting for themselves and the interest of the mid-level players?
i dont know which side to take anymore.

I think that is a fair statement.

The average salary is around $5M but the median is around $2.3M.

I guess the issue is, as Coon says, most guys are not deluding themselves about a max deal but they all hope to get a mid-level - and who wouldn't at $35M over 5 years.

[Apollo]

I think word "some" is the key word in that tweet. How many is "some"? It would also help if we had an idea which owners had this position.

I think the "some" are those losing money and those who feel they stand to lose money soon. The big market owners are probably the ones who want no part of a season long lockout.

[Joey]

I think the "some" are those losing money and those who feel they stand to lose money soon. The big market owners are probably the ones who want no part of a season long lockout.

Agreed.

Which makes the entire thing even more difficult to read, because there is clearl a divide amongst the owners, as well as within the players ranks.

Seems like there are 2 teams; only it's not Owners vs. Players.
Almost like 'Some Owners'+'Some Players' vs. 'Some Owners'+'Some Players'.